Students

About a month ago, during one of our weekly team meetings, we were sitting around discussing the most frequently asked questions from students across the country – Why does a starving child’s stomach stick out as if he were full? What do parents do while their children are enrolled in a nutrition program? – and we wondered how we could answer the questions for everyone.

We are proud to present Kayla Baker as the winner of Action Against Hunger’s first online student contest. Kayla, an 8th grader from Lebanon, Oregon, decided to enter ACF’s student contest to raise awareness about global hunger. Her poem, Hunger, was inspired by the people in her community struggling with hunger.

On March 29th, a group of individuals stopped by Action Against Hunger's office in New York City to present us with a donation raised by the students and faculty of City College of San Francisco’s John Adams Campus. Here is their inspiring story:

This year, the Race Against Hunger promises to be bigger than ever. A national service-learning campaign to educate students about the symptoms and underlying causes of global hunger and malnutrition, the Race also raises vital funds for Action Against Hunger’s life-saving programs around the world.

Admission Possible is a non-profit organization dedicated to helping promising high school students from low income communities prepare for and earn admission to college. This year, students involved in Admission Possible had the opportunity to participate in a program called Make A Difference, consisting of a competitive food-drive in conjunction with a three week long fundraiser named “The War of 1400” for the 1400 students involved in the event.

This past September, Alameda High School in California started a Hunger Awareness Leaders of Tomorrow (HALT) chapter at their school after Linh Phung, a Senior, came across the Action Against Hunger website.

“With the help of school announcements, our kind club sponsor Mr. Hardin and hours spent making posters to help publicize the club, our HALT chapter was finally up and running.

Action Against Hunger | ACF International has partnered with students from Lebanon Valley College to start the first chapter of the national student organization, Hunger Awareness Leaders of Tomorrow (HALT).

HALT began when Jimmy Kroll, a student eager to get involved in the fight against global hunger, contacted ACF after visiting the New York headquarters on a school trip. We started brainstorming and decided to start an ACF-affiliated student organization devoted to raising awareness about global hunger issues and about ACF’s field programs.

Students from all over the country have responded to global hunger’s growing prominence in the news—global food riots, the spike in food prices, and revised estimates that global hunger now affects 963 million people (up from 854 million a couple years ago). These headlines have moved America’s youth to take action in creative ways, whether forming service learning clubs at school, holding educational fundraisers such as ACF’s Fast for Awareness, or taking individual action to raise awareness and funds by skating across the U.S. for Action Against Hunger!

Armed with youthful idealism and a desire to make the world a better place, students around the country are making strides in the fight against global hunger with ACF’s international Race Against Hunger campaign. Modeled after Action Against Hunger’s highly successful student outreach program in France, the Race Against Hunger aims to educate middle school students about the problem of global hunger while inspiring them to be part of the solution. Spring 2008 marked Action Against Hunger’s pilot Race Against Hunger in the U.S., with four middle schools participating in Chicago, Illinois.

Students at Clinton Township Middle School in New Jersey created a poignant learning activity on global hunger with a project called Hands 4 Hunger that symbolizes the 25,000 people who die every day from hunger-related causes. Students created a collage of 2,500 colorful hand-shaped cutouts, each representing 10 of these 25,000 fatalities. As a public display, the collage educates as well as impresses, providing facts about global hunger.